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Rugby Is OK

I’m going to my newly-local stadium today to watch rugby league for the first time since, oooooh, 2013, when we lost 16-0 to Wigan. Allegedly I was also there in 2008 when we lost to St Helens, though I have absolutely no recollection of this.

Some Hull City AFC fans seem to have quite an animosity towards rugby league, perhaps partly due to the media always saying that Hull is a rugby town. I have no such animosity towards it.

I actually went to watch the rugby before I went to watch Hull City AFC. My dad would take me to the rugby, my mother to the football.

It’s not so easy to follow rugby league down south. Whenever someone down here talks about rugby, they are not talking about Featherstone vs Wakefield. Some don’t even know that there is a much superior code played up north.

Rugby league has what football does not have any more. Tackles, toughness, fairness – and the ability to drink beer whilst sat in your seat – I went to an England football game at Wembley last year and you couldn’t even have a drink on the concourse!

The aspects of football that most annoy me – the money, diving, cheating, whining at the referee – are all absent from rugby league. Yet I’ll still come back to football.

I won’t be switching on the radio tonight to listen to the views of Hull FC fans. I’ll be switching it on to listen to Arsenal fans moan about Wenger.

I won’t be watching the highlights of the rugby, or the interviews with the managers. I might well watch Match Of The Day.

As soon as the game is over tonight, I’ll be hotfooting it to The Spread Eagle to watch the football.

My father has repeatedly watched Hull FC not win at Wembley and the last time he told me that his final opportunity to do so had gone. I knew that was bullshit – I can feel that we are going to win today.

And with regards to the other matter of the day, I am going to go for 2-2. I’m not sure I’m optimistic enough to back City to beat United, so a draw with a few goals is the most I can hope for. I’d certainly take a draw! 22-1 with Bet365 if you fancied 2-2.